\By: Fern Sidman – Jewish Voice News

In a stark warning that called attention to the fragility of the year-old ceasefire along Israel’s northern border, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) accused Lebanese terrorist organization Hezbollah on Tuesday of rebuilding its military capabilities in southern Lebanon—potentially erasing the security gains achieved under last year’s truce. According to a report on Tuesday in The Algemeiner, the Israeli military believes that Hezbollah, emboldened by Iran’s financial and logistical backing, is attempting to reestablish its operational footprint south of the Litani River in clear violation of international agreements, thereby setting the stage for another confrontation.

At the center of this growing crisis lies the 2024 ceasefire accord, painstakingly brokered with U.S. mediation after Israel’s large-scale campaign devastated Hezbollah’s leadership and infrastructure. That truce was meant to permanently push Hezbollah’s forces north of the Litani River and ensure that Lebanon’s national army—rather than Tehran’s proxy—maintained security in the southern border region. Yet, as The Algemeiner reported, Israeli officials now contend that the group’s violations are “systematic, deliberate, and accelerating,” threatening to unravel the tenuous calm that has prevailed for barely a year.

Addressing reporters at a briefing in Tel Aviv, IDF spokesperson Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani accused Hezbollah of smuggling arms from Syria and reconstituting command nodes disguised as civilian infrastructure across southern Lebanon. “We are working to block the ground routes from Syria into Lebanon to a high level of success,” Shoshani said, according to the report in The Algemeiner, “but they still pose a threat to us. We will not return to the reality of October 7, with thousands of terrorists massed within walking distance of our civilians.”

Shoshani’s comments referenced Israel’s trauma following Hamas’s October 7, 2023, massacre, an event that profoundly reshaped Israel’s national security posture. The IDF now views any buildup of Iranian-backed militias near its borders as intolerable. Israeli airstrikes in recent weeks, The Algemeiner report confirmed, have targeted Hezbollah weapons caches, surveillance posts, and supply convoys, including those moving through Bekaa Valley routes traditionally used to ferry Iranian munitions from Syria.

Hezbollah, for its part, claims it remains committed to the ceasefire but denies rebuilding its arsenal. In a televised address on Tuesday, the group’s deputy secretary-general Sheikh Naim Qassem insisted that “there is no alternative” to the 2024 truce, adding that Hezbollah has refrained from firing on Israel since the ceasefire took hold. Yet Qassem’s reassurances were paired with renewed defiance: “Israel’s destructive and deadly strikes cannot continue,” he said. “There is a limit to everything.”

Qassem reiterated Hezbollah’s categorical rejection of full disarmament—an issue at the core of the ceasefire agreement—and hinted that any further Israeli incursions could trigger a broader escalation.

Lebanon’s government, divided between Western-leaning technocrats and Hezbollah-aligned politicians, has found itself trapped between international pressure and domestic instability. President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam accused Israel of breaching the truce by maintaining five hilltop positions inside Lebanese territory and conducting recurrent aerial strikes. “Israel is violating the agreement daily,” Salam said, citing recent drone incursions near the villages of Aita al-Shaab and Khiam.

As The Algemeiner report observed, Lebanon’s civilian leadership remains hamstrung by Hezbollah’s entrenched power within the state. The Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF), while nominally tasked with implementing disarmament in the south, have hesitated to raid private homes or Hezbollah-controlled neighborhoods for fear of reigniting sectarian violence. A senior Lebanese security official told Reuters that the army’s approach has been “cautious but effective,” emphasizing de-escalation over confrontation.

However, military analysts quoted in The Algemeiner report dismissed such claims as wishful thinking. “The LAF is walking on eggshells,” one Israeli intelligence officer said. “They know that pushing too hard risks civil war, but doing too little means Hezbollah becomes stronger by the day.”

Hezbollah’s influence in Lebanon’s Shi’ite communities, particularly in the Bekaa Valley and southern regions, remains formidable. The group has not only maintained a vast network of local militias but has also embedded itself in the country’s social and economic infrastructure—operating schools, hospitals, and reconstruction programs that win popular support even as they serve military objectives.

The 2024 ceasefire followed one of the most intense military campaigns in recent history. In the months after Hezbollah launched rocket and drone attacks on Israel’s northern frontier—ostensibly to “support” Hamas amid the Gaza conflict—Israel retaliated with sweeping air and ground operations that decimated Hezbollah’s senior leadership. The fighting left southern Lebanon’s infrastructure in ruins and forced tens of thousands of Lebanese civilians to flee northward.

The ceasefire, brokered with U.S. and French involvement, was intended to stabilize the border while setting a roadmap for disarmament. Under the agreement, Beirut committed to removing all Hezbollah weapons south of the Litani River, a measure backed by the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL). In return, Israel pledged to gradually withdraw from limited tactical positions it occupied during the fighting.

In early 2025, Lebanon accepted a U.S.-backed disarmament plan, which required Hezbollah’s full demilitarization by November in exchange for an Israeli withdrawal and suspension of airstrikes. But implementation has lagged badly. As The Algemeiner report noted, the Lebanese army insists it can declare the south “free of Hezbollah arms” by the end of 2025, yet refuses to enter private dwellings—an omission that renders meaningful disarmament nearly impossible.

“The goal should be to reach a better agreement now,” said Hanin Ghaddar, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, in remarks to The Algemeiner. “The ceasefire was a good start, but it lacked a clear timeline, and Hezbollah is using this period to rearm and rebuild itself militarily, financially, and politically. The stronger Hezbollah becomes, the weaker Lebanon gets—and the prospects for peace will continue to diminish.”

Ghaddar’s assessment reflects a growing consensus among Western analysts that the truce, while stabilizing in the short term, has failed to address the structural imbalance that allows Hezbollah to operate as a “state within a state.”

Behind Hezbollah’s resurgence looms the unmistakable hand of Iran, which has long viewed the group as its most valuable regional proxy. Israeli intelligence sources cited in The Algemeiner report indicate that Tehran has significantly increased the flow of cash, weapons, and advisors into Lebanon over the past six months. The shipments include precision-guided munitions and drone components funneled through Syria’s Tartus port and smuggled across the porous border by Hezbollah operatives.

Iran’s support, analysts say, is part of a broader strategy to maintain pressure on Israel from multiple fronts—Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, and the Red Sea—ensuring that the Jewish state remains encircled by Iranian-backed militias even as it pursues victory over Hamas. “Hezbollah is Iran’s insurance policy,” one regional expert told The Algemeiner. “It exists to deter Israel, absorb Israeli resources, and project Tehran’s influence across the Levant.”

Israel, for its part, has redoubled efforts to disrupt these supply chains, launching airstrikes on weapons depots and border crossings inside Syria. But Hezbollah’s decentralized logistics network—relying on civilian vehicles, hidden tunnels, and sympathetic local militias—makes total interdiction elusive.

For Hezbollah, the rhetoric of “resistance” remains central to its identity and legitimacy. Since its founding in the early 1980s, the group has framed itself as Lebanon’s defender against Israeli “aggression,” even as it undermines Lebanese sovereignty and drags the country into repeated conflicts.

In his speech Tuesday, Naim Qassem invoked this narrative once again, accusing Israel of seeking to “occupy Lebanon by other means.” He demanded that Israel withdraw from its five remaining outposts and release Lebanese prisoners, warning that continued “provocations” could shatter the ceasefire.

Yet, as The Algemeiner report emphasized, Hezbollah’s insistence on retaining its weapons underscores its refusal to be bound by state authority. “Disarmament would strip Hezbollah of its identity and its leverage,” explained a former Israeli defense official. “It cannot coexist with a sovereign Lebanese state because it thrives on the vacuum of sovereignty.”

The United States, which played a key role in crafting the 2024 ceasefire, has grown increasingly impatient with Lebanon’s slow pace of enforcement. Washington has dispatched multiple delegations in recent weeks to press Beirut for tangible progress. According to the information provided in The Algemeiner report, American diplomats have conveyed that future U.S. aid—both military and economic—could hinge on demonstrable steps toward neutralizing Hezbollah’s arsenal.

Nevertheless, U.S. officials privately concede that full disarmament by year’s end is unrealistic. “No one expects miracles,” a senior State Department source told The Algemeiner. “But Lebanon must at least show the political will to confront Hezbollah, not defer to it.”

European governments, meanwhile, have called for restraint on both sides. France, which maintains close historical ties with Lebanon, has urged Israel to avoid “provocative” military actions while quietly supporting American efforts to strengthen the Lebanese Armed Forces.

From Israel’s perspective, Hezbollah’s rearmament campaign risks upending a delicate deterrence equation established after the 2006 Lebanon War and reaffirmed under last year’s truce. The Algemeiner report noted that Israeli defense planners have long viewed the Lebanese front as potentially more dangerous than Gaza, given Hezbollah’s possession of up to 150,000 rockets—some capable of striking anywhere in Israel.

Israeli officials fear that a renewed buildup in southern Lebanon could once again place major population centers such as Haifa and Nahariya within easy range of rocket fire. “We cannot allow an Iranian militia to reestablish terror bases within five kilometers of Israeli towns,” said an IDF Northern Command officer quoted by The Algemeiner. “Our objective is to ensure that what happened in Gaza never happens again in the Galilee.”

This strategic calculus helps explain Israel’s preemptive strikes on Hezbollah installations and its continued occupation of several hilltop positions in Lebanon. Israeli officials argue that these outposts—though technically outside Israeli territory—provide crucial surveillance advantages against cross-border infiltration attempts.

For Lebanon, the stakes could not be higher. Still reeling from economic collapse, endemic corruption, and political paralysis, the country teeters on the brink of renewed internal conflict. Hezbollah’s militarization has effectively sidelined the state, leaving ordinary Lebanese trapped between international pressure and militant coercion.

“The stronger Hezbollah becomes, the weaker Lebanon gets,” Hanin Ghaddar told The Algemeiner, echoing a sentiment widely shared in Western policy circles. “As long as Hezbollah controls Lebanon’s security agenda, the country will remain hostage to Iran’s regional ambitions—and peace will remain an illusion.”

For Israel, the lesson of the past year is equally stark. Despite a ceasefire that promised de-escalation, its northern border remains volatile, overshadowed by an enemy that refuses to disarm and a Lebanese government unable—or unwilling—to enforce its own sovereignty.

As The Algemeiner report observed, the situation embodies the paradox of Middle Eastern diplomacy: a peace agreement without peace, a truce without trust, and a ceasefire sustained only by the threat of another war.

The coming months will test whether the 2024 ceasefire can survive amid rising mistrust and competing narratives. Israel’s strikes, Hezbollah’s defiance, and Lebanon’s paralysis together form a combustible mix—one spark away from reigniting a regional conflict.

For now, both sides profess commitment to peace, but the realities on the ground tell a different story. Hezbollah’s shadow army continues to dig in; Israeli jets continue to circle over Tyre and Nabatieh; and Lebanon’s fragile state continues to fracture under the weight of its contradictions.

As was noted in The Algemeiner report, “The war between Israel and Hezbollah never truly ended—it merely changed form.” The question now is whether diplomacy can prevent it from changing back.